THIS WEEKEND IN CHICAGO – WELCOME TO 2020!

It’s 2020 but this first weekend of the new year is your last chance to visit holiday displays until next winter!  Hopefully they’ll be less crowded and more enjoyable!!

Join the Lincoln Park Zoo (2001 N. Clark St.) in the Lincoln Park neighborhood as they celebrate 25 years of Zoolights. It’s a one-of-a-kind festive holiday experience featuring hundreds of luminous displays and incredible seasonal activities, all under the glow of 2.5 million lights.  Plus guests are free to wander through the zoo, snap photos of the displays, and enjoy ice sculpture carving, food, music, carousel, and train rides!  It’s quite the holiday light display to behold!!

The Lincoln Park Conservatory (2301 N. Stockton Dr.) in the Lincoln Park neighborhood features a Winter Flower and Train Show from 9:00 a.m.-5:00 p.m.  This event features “Ice Age” imagery of glaciers, a woolly mammoth, and hundreds of white poinsettias and plants.  Two trains roll through this wintery landscape dotted with white and blue sparkling lights while a large fir tree with lights greets visitors in the Palm House!

Every year, the Museum of Science & Industry (5700 S. Lake Shore Dr.) in the Hyde Park neighborhood puts up its 45-foot-tall Grand Tree surrounded by 50+ trees representing holiday traditions from cultures around the globe during Christmas Around the World and Holidays of Light.  Not only will visitors admire the 30,000 lights that cover the trees but they’ll also see snow falling from the rotunda every 30 minutes and enjoy a live holiday performance!  And to think this began in 1942 with a single tree!!

See colorful tree lights and projections on a one mile walk at Illumination: Tree Lights at the Morton Arboretum (4100 Illinois Route 53) in Lisle (27 miles west of Chicago).  Visitors will be surrounded by color, light, and sound amid interactive lighting effects!  Then warm up by a crackling fire with hot beverages and s’mores!!  Also this year’s event debuts a new route with a more spacious pathway for this popular winter event!

For those who’ve had enough of the holidays, perhaps the following events are more to your liking:

Explore the trendy River North neighborhood while discovering some of Chicago’s best craft beers and delicious wines paired with bacon and pork treats such as bacon-stuffed deep-dish pizza and pork-inspired hors d’oeuvres on the Winter Beer, Bacon, Wine & Swine Tour.  You’ll even learn the true history of Chicago pizza!  After all, nothing stops Chicagoans from venturing outdoors for beer, bacon, and wine!!

Take in a hockey game as our Chicago Blackhawks host the Detroit Red Wings this Sunday (6:30 p.m.) at the United Center (1901 W. Madison St.) on the Near West Side.

Enjoy – It’s Back to Reality Next Week!!